The police officer and cook worked with outside insurgents, tampering the food of their colleagues, which killed two fellow police officers. Following that, militants attacked with gunfire, killing the remaining four officers, leaving six dead in total. The perpetrators fled and remain at large.

This was only the latest in an increasingly common type of insider attacks by infiltrators within the Afghan security forces. Most targets have been foreign troops, primarily American, but many have also killed Afghans.

At least 51 NATO troops have been killed this year in these “insider attacks,” in a blatant failure of one of the Obama administration’s primary missions in Afghanistan: to build up indigenous military and police forces to take over security and continue to fight the Taliban and associated militants.

Vast majorities of the American public and the Washington establishment are beginning to acknowledge the failure of the war, which is what is behind President Obama’s repeated statements about withdrawing troops in 2014.

But the State Department is already involved in talks with the Kabul government to come to an agreement that will govern the presence of US forces in Afghanistan beyond 2014. As many as 25,000 troops will remain, perhaps until 2024.